


Welcome to Tomorrow

by dragonimp



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-23
Updated: 2016-07-23
Packaged: 2018-07-25 07:28:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7523866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonimp/pseuds/dragonimp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Written for Roy/Ed week 2016, with the prompt "The stroke of midnight."</p></blockquote>





	Welcome to Tomorrow

“The doctors are being fucking paranoid,” Ed griped. “I mean, I _get_ it, Al looks like he’s been starved for four years. But it’s not like I’d let anything happen to him.”

Roy listened with amusement as Ed bustled around his apartment. “Did you really expect them to understand? What the two of you have been through is beyond the worldview of even most alchemists.”

“We explained it to them,” he protested. “Or we tried to. But still, it’s not like they’d be sending Al out on his own. I’d be there. I’m not about to let anything happen to him _now_.”

“Did your brother get tired of you hovering again?”

For a moment the only sound was the clattering of dishes.

“I wasn’t _hovering_ ,” he finally muttered.

Roy chuckled. “So instead you decided to come hover over me? I don’t know if I should be flattered or insulted.”

“Don’t let it go to your head, Mustang. I was _bored_.”

“Bored enough to bring take-out _and_ clean up afterwards?”

“Whatever.” Ed turned the water on hard, drowning out any further discussion.

Roy chuckled again and obligingly let it drop.

In truth he was grateful for the distraction; he’d had a long, tiring day of one frustration after another. Right now even his pride was willing to sit back and let someone else take care of things for a while.

His entire (former) team had taken to checking in on him. It could get irritating at times, but he had to admit it gave him a certain amount of security. They were getting pretty good about helping out without treating him like he was useless. Ed could be a little clumsy at it still, but he was so endearing in his brute caring that Roy couldn’t take offense.

“Please don’t break my dishes,” he said now to Ed’s over-exuberant washing up. “I don’t have that many.”

“If I break ’em I can just—” Ed cut himself off. “. . . Oh. No. I guess I can’t.”

Roy perked up at that, but held his tongue. The young man hadn’t talked much about giving up his alchemy. It had to be weighing on him, but if he wasn’t ready, Roy wasn’t going to push.

“Anyway, I’m not gonna break your stupid dishes,” Ed declared. Matter closed.

“Much appreciated.”

They fell quiet. It was a comfortable sort of silence; something had shifted between them during the Promised Day that had burned out any lingering awkwardness or formality. Ed had seen him at his worst—his most savage, and his most vulnerable. He had seen the depths of Ed’s strength, and his compassion. Even the volatile love/hate attraction between them had calmed down to something less antagonistic.

Ed shut off the water. It sounded as if he was placing the last few dishes on the drying rack—probably haphazardly. Roy was still amazed that Ed’s dish constructs didn’t topple. “Why’s your kitchen so small? There’s nowhere to put anything.” Ed asked. “Your whole place is small. Why’s it only one room?”

“It’s called a ‘studio,’ and why should I spend money for a large place when it’s just me? I’m hardly home anyway.” He paused, the weeks since the Promised Day flashing through his mind. “Well . . . that _used_ to be the case.”

Ed bumped a fist against his shoulder. His right fist; flesh now instead of steel, but so much scrawnier than this left.

“You got any booze?”

“You’re too young to drink.”

“I’m too young to _buy_ alcohol,” Ed retorted.

“I’m pretty sure there’s a clause in there about supplying alcohol to minors.” Roy waved in the general direction of the liquor cabinet anyway. Or what he was pretty sure was the right direction. “Pour some whiskey for me while you’re at it.”

“Whiskey, whiskey. . . .” The cabinet door creaked open, and then he heard the heavy _clinks_ of liquid-filled glass containers. “I’m guessing it’s not this dark red stuff.”

“That would be wine.”

“Big fat bottle?”

“Porter.”

“Ummm . . . oh, here. Weird flat bottle. ‘Single malt whiskey.’ What does that even mean?”

“It means it hasn’t been mixed with any other grain or batch.”

“Does that even matter?” Ed asked as he poured the alcohol into glasses. “Don’t answer—I’m sure it does, and I’m sure I don’t care.”

“No one would ever mistake you for a connoisseur, Fullmetal.”

“You know that’s not my name anymore.”

Roy paused. Ed hadn’t sounded upset or offended, just . . . reflective. “I’m sorry. Old habits.”

“I don’t mind, I guess. I mean, that’s who I was for a long time. It’s just . . . kinda odd now.”

Ed set one of the drinks down in front of him. Roy reached toward the sound until his fingers bumped glass. “We’re all still getting used to how things are now.”

“Yeah.” Ed pulled out a chair and dropped into it. “Fu-u-uck that’s strong.”

Roy smirked, savoring the burn of the first sip. “You didn’t think I would have cheap stuff, did you?”

“Is that where all your money goes? ’Cause it ain’t going to your digs.” Ed coughed. “ _Shit_.”

“You aren’t obligated to finish.”

“Hell no, some snobby-ass drink ain’t getting the better of me.” He coughed again. “Besides, the taste is growin’ on me.”

“Are you aware your accent is coming out?”

Ed let out a startled sound, then laughed. “Shit. You’re right. I must be tired—I haven’t even had enough of this to be tipsy yet.”

“Speaking of Resembool—do you and your brother have any plans yet, for going forward from here?”

Ed signed. For a moment the only sounds were the drinks being sipped, and the hiss of the glasses against the table.

“Not . . . really,” he eventually admitted. “I—sort of—never expected to get this far. I mean I _did_ , but—I didn’t.”

Roy nodded. That was something he was all too familiar with.

“Al, right now, just wants to taste every food he can get his hands on, pet every kitten in existence, and sit out in the rain at _least_ once.”

He chuckled. “Have you convinced him to hold off on that last until you’re more confident in his immune system?”

“Only because it hasn’t rained yet.” Ed sighed again. “None of the legends and hero epics ever tell you about this part, y’know?”

“I guess ‘trying to get on with life’ doesn’t make for a compelling narrative.”

“Leaves guys like us shit outa luck, though.”

“I’m still amazed we didn’t end up like one of those Cretan tragedies where everyone dies and the gods expound over mortal hubris.”

“Is that clock right?”

Roy raised an eyebrow. “The last time I _saw_ it, it was.”

“Argh, right, sorry.”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because if it is, it’s after midnight.”

“That late?” He finished off his drink. “My sense of time has been shot to hell.”

“It’s tomorrow.”

“. . . Yes?”

“My birthday is tomorrow. Today.”

Roy raised his head in surprise. “Really? It’s that late in the year already?”

“I’d lost track, too. Al pointed it out last week.” Ed’s glass slid back and forth against the wood. “I’m sixteen now.”

Roy closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. “Thank you for getting out of the military before this day.”

“What?”

He shook his head and waved the question off. “Nothing. Any plans to celebrate? This is a pretty monumental birthday.”

“Well. . . .” Ed sounded nervous. “There kinda is something I want. . . .”

“Yes?”

He jumped when Ed’s hand closed in the front of his shirt, then breathed out a laugh and let the young man—yes, legally a man now—pull him forward.

Ed’s lips were soft. Hesitant. Roy leaned in and cupped the back of his neck, trying to encourage without taking over. Ed made a low noise and pressed back, and Roy yielded gladly.

By the time they broke apart Ed had both hands twisted in his shirt. Roy caressed his wrist, laughing. “So how long have you been planning that?”

Ed snickered. “Well, I wouldn’t say _planned_ , exactly—I mean, I never thought I’d get this far. That _we’d_ get this far. But—y’know. A while.”

“Mm.” Roy tugged on his wrist and Ed leaned in for another kiss.

“So,” he said afterwards. “It’s your birthday—what _else_ do you want?”

“Well . . . I have a _few_ ideas. . . .”

“Do tell.”

“I’d rather show. . . .”

He laughed again as Ed stood and hauled him to his feet.

“What about you?” Ed asked as he led them out of the small dining area of the apartment. “Did _you_ have any plans for when I turned legal?”

“Plans—no. Ideas—yes.” Roy’s shin bumped agains the side of the bed as they stopped.

“Like what?”

“Well . . . such as. . . .”

He ducked down and locked his hands beneath Ed’s bottom—that ass that was now legal for him to covet—then straightened and dumped them both onto the bed. Ed’s startled laughter was like music and the way he clutched at his shoulders was a gift itself.

“Such as making off with you and having my way with you before you knew what had happened.” Roy kissed along his jaw and throat. “Mmm . . . or locking my office door and bending you over my desk—back when I still _had_ an office and a desk—and watching bits of _you_ get all over my paperwork—”

“Eww—” Ed snickered. His head was arched back, making himself vulnerable for Roy’s lips. “I think Hawkeye would’ve had something to say about that one.”

“Undoubtedly.” He dipped his tongue into the hollow between his collar bones and started unbuttoning his shirt. “But mostly. . . .” He kissed the bolt that had once held the automail port in place. “Mostly I just. . . .”

Ed made a questioning noise when he trailed off. Roy sat up, his smile turned wistful as he brushed back the hair of the young man before him, tracing the curve of his brow down to his temple. “Mostly I would picture you like this. Laid out before me, hair spread out on my pillow. Looking at me like—like you wanted nothing more than to be _here_.”

Ed took one hand, then the other, bringing them both to his lips. “You still can. See that.” He tugged him down, and Roy leaned one elbow against the bed as Ed laced his fingers behind his neck. “It’s not the same—nothing will ever be the same—but the thing about us ‘ordinary humans’? What makes us so strong? We adapt. And we keep getting back up.”

Roy stroked his face, letting his fingertips run over every contour. “If there’s one thing I’m certain of, it’s that _nothing_ ever turns out how we plan it,” he said. “And . . . maybe that’s okay.”

Ed was smiling at him—grinning—and his eyes were soft. “So you gonna help me celebrate this birthday or what?”

Roy kissed him. Kissed him like there was nothing else in the world.

Ed carded fingers through his hair, sometimes stroking, sometimes pulling. Roy groaned and scraped his teeth against his lip. The young man let out a delicious sound, something between a whimper and a moan.

Ed rolled them. Roy grinned and lay back, letting him yank his shirt open and wrestle it down his arms. “Damn,” Ed muttered as he tossed the shirt to one side. Palms skimmed down his chest and stomach. “For someone who’s been manning a desk for the last several years, you’ve done pretty good.”

Roy smirked. “Just because my work has been mostly sedentary doesn’t mean I don’t take pride in myself.”

“Well for once your ego is working.”

As Ed bent down to kiss along his chest, Roy found his hair tie and pulled it free. He ran his fingers through the thick strands and let it fall, sweeping down to tickle his skin. “You’re gorgeous,” he murmured. “Do you know that?”

Ed’s huffed-out breath whispered out across the moisture left from his mouth. “I’m a mess of scars and metal with a few decent features.”

Roy shook his head, smiling at the memory of Ed fighting those mindless creatures beneath Central command, and the passion in his face as he shouted Roy down from the precipice of his own rage. “No. You’re exquisite. Every inch of you.”

“You’re crazy,” Ed declared as he sat back. “And kinda biased.”

That shocked a laugh out of him. “I’ll have you know I’m the paragon of objectivity.”

“Yeah, you’re _completely_ detached.”

Was he rolling his eyes? Roy guessed that he was.

Ed tugged his belt loose, then hesitated. Roy covered his hand where it had paused at his waistband, having to guess the problem without the aid of expressions and only minimal body language. “Ed—if you don’t want to—it’s okay.”

“No, I _do_ ,” he rushed to explain. “I—very much want to. It’s just . . . sort of. . . .”

“New?”

Ed’s answer was a barely audible mumble that sounded close to “Yeah.”

Roy squeezed his hand. “Whatever you’re comfortable with. All right?”

He heard him take a breath, and then he hesitantly unfastened the slacks.

Roy lifted his hips to let him slide the garment down. Ed drew back for a moment to tug the slacks free and drop them to the floor, and then he felt knees, still clad, on either side of his bare thighs. A hand stroked his hip, moving cautiously in toward his groin. Roy could feel himself responding, moving toward a full erection just from Ed’s touch on his skin.

“Shit,” Ed breathed. His thumb brushed against his balls and Roy gasped.

The void was starting to be too much. Roy slid the fingers of one hand up his arm to his shoulder, and then to his neck. Both hands found his face, his fingers refusing to be still, wanting to touch everything at once. Wanting to know what his eyes could no longer tell him.

Ed stroked him more deliberately, leaning into his hands. “So what else did you fantasize about?” he said. “What else have you always wanted to do to me?”

He smirked. “Let’s see now. . . .”

At his nudge Ed rolled onto his back, letting Roy switch their positions. Roy reached down and fanned his hair out. Maybe he couldn’t see the halo of gold. But he could feel it. “Some start like this. Simple. Just you, letting me touch you.” He caressed his jaw and throat. “And me, savoring every inch of skin and metal.”

“Sounds good so far.” Ed was grinning at him, he could hear it. “Pretty basic, though.”

“It’s always best to start with the basics.” He dipped his head and scraped his teeth against Ed’s collar bone. “Things rarely end there.”

Ed’s gasp might have been more accurately described as a squeak.

“Then I’d lay you bare,” he said into the young man’s skin. He’d already gotten a start on Ed’s shirt. He quickly finished the job, and then ran his hands and lips the length of his torso, marking every scar and bolt. “Sometimes I would keep you like this for a while. Just like this. Watch you strain against your trousers as I teased you and teased you.”

“Fu-uck.”

Roy caught a nipple between his teeth, biting down just hard enough to hear that squeak again. “Sometimes we’d get right down to it and I would lay into you so hard you would forget your own name.”

He flattened his palm against the bulge in Ed’s trousers before he unhooked his belt. “And sometimes—oh, sometimes, you would let me tie you down—” Ed gasped at that, “—and I would get to show you just what you do to me— _just_ how exquisite you are.”

Roy stepped off the bed to ease the last of Ed’s clothing down, listening to the erratic breathing and the rustling as the divine creature before him shifted and squirmed.

“All—all that, huh?”

“And more.” He skimmed his hands up the young man’s legs, both metal and flesh. “When I would let myself dream.”

“Fuc— _ah_!”

Roy cupped him, gently kneading his sack and stroking his length. Learning his unique shape. “But reality is so much better than dreams.”

With that he knelt down and took the cock in his mouth, caressing the head with his lips and tongue. Ed let out a strangled moan and got a double grip on his hair, his hips twitching as if he didn’t know whether he wanted to thrust or squirm.

Roy grinned around his mouthful, holding him down with one hand and steadying him at the base with the other. He sucked, first lightly, then with more enthusiasm as he rubbed his tongue against the tip.

“Roy—” Ed was suddenly pushing at him, and Roy pulled back. “If you keep doing that—I-I’m gonna—”

He chuckled, wiping precum from his lips. “Isn’t that the point?”

“Yeah, but—” Ed tugged his shoulder, and kept tugging until Roy lay down on the bed next to him. “Not _yet_.”

Ed rolled and pressed against him, kissing him. After a moment he pulled back, and flicked a curious tongue against Roy’s lips. “Huh. Is _that_ what I taste like?”

Roy laughed. “More or less. Problem?”

He tasted his lips again. Roy darted his own tongue out, startling another squeak out of him.

“Bastard. And no. It’s . . . weird, but . . . not _good_ , really, but . . . kinda . . . hot?”

He laughed again, and decided there was no better response than to kiss him. Ed leaned in, gripping his hip.

“Mnn . . . this,” Ed murmured into his lips. “ _This_ is what I want right now.” He gyrated. Roy groaned and matched, hooking a leg over his hips. “Just us—like this— _both_ of us—”

Roy caught his lips, working a hand between them and pressing them both against his own stomach.

“Mn. Not that I don’t . . .” Ed said between kisses, “. . . want to try those . . . other things . . . or maybe—” and now he was grinning, “—I could tie _you_ up—”

“Oh god—”

He wasn’t sure which of them came first.

Ed was courteous enough to clean them up afterwards with only some minor grumbling. Roy lay on the bed, feeling spent. But more content than he’d been in . . . he wasn’t sure how long. Too long.

Ed finally came back and stretched out next to him, pulling the blankets up. “Not too bad of a birthday.”

Roy laughed and pinched his side. “Insubordinate wretch.”

Ed squeaked and poked him back, and they spent several seconds jabbing back and forth before they both dissolved into giggles.

“Fuck.” Ed stroked his hair as Roy settled into his shoulder. “I like things much better like this. No rank, no command—not trying to get one over on each other—”

“Mmm,” Roy agreed. After everything, they damn well deserved a bit of peace.

Ed stroked his hair again. “You should come out to Resembool.”

“Mm?”

“Sometime soon. See the country—well, not _see_ it, but—you know what I mean.”

He chuckled. “Hear the country?”

“And smell it. The air is different out there.”

“More sheep?”

“And less cars.” Ed nuzzled his forehead. “And it’s—quiet. So much that it gets on my nerves sometimes, but—you can relax out there. And after all that’s happened. . . .”

“Mmm . . . that does sound nice.” Roy tilted his head back, bumping their noses together. “Tell you what. Let me find my feet again . . . and I may take you up on that.”

“I’m gonna call and nag at you until you do.”

“Bull-headed twerp.”

“You know it.”

And he _knew_ Ed was grinning.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Roy/Ed week 2016, with the prompt "The stroke of midnight."


End file.
